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Space

All articles tagged with #space

space11 minutes ago•105 min saved

Guarding the Night Sky: Critics Push for Environmental Review of Space-Based Data Centers

Environmental and scientific groups are pressing the FCC to require environmental reviews for licenses to deploy space-based data centers, citing SpaceX’s plan to launch up to a million satellites in low-Earth orbit and concerns about dark skies, wildlife, climate impacts from rocket launches and debris. The FCC has not yet mandated such reviews, prompting a coalition led by Earthjustice to urge regulatory scrutiny before licenses are granted.

via Space|

#environmental-impact #fcc #orbital-debris

space22 minutes ago•12 min saved

Mars as a Living Laboratory: Science‑First Missions to Seek Life

A NASA-backed Mars plan centers on survival and life-support first each sol, then science—drilling for biosignatures, tracing habitability, and testing in-situ resource use—within architectures like 30-Cargo-300 and 30-30-30 that include sample return; discussions include deep drilling, potential nuclear propulsion (SR‑1 Freedom) and autonomous crews due to long Earth–Mars communications delays, all aimed at answering whether life existed on Mars and how a sustainable outpost could work.

via BBC Sky at Night Magazine|

#autonomy #biosignatures #human-exploration

space22 minutes ago•7 min saved

Jupiter-sized survivor orbits a cooling white dwarf, defying expectations

Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope studied WD 1856 b, a Jupiter-sized planet that survived its Sun-like star’s red-giant phase and now orbits a cooling white dwarf about 75 light-years away. The eight-minute grazing transit revealed an atmosphere with methane and hazes, and a surprisingly hot around-400 K temperature, indicating internal reheating rather than just re-radiating energy from the star. The data favor a late inward migration caused by gravitational interactions with distant stellar companions over a common-envelope origin, suggesting more planetary survivors may await discovery near nearby white dwarfs.

via Ars Technica|

#gas-giant #jwst #planetary-migration

space44 minutes ago•103 min saved

Dawn Jellyfish: SpaceX's Starlink Launch Colors the Florida Sky

SpaceX launched 29 Starlink satellites from Cape Canaveral in the early hours of July 9, 2026 (5:25 a.m. EDT). The rocket’s exhaust cooled and froze into ice crystals, creating a spectacular plume that, when lit by sunrise, looked like a glowing jellyfish in the night sky. It’s a natural byproduct of rocket launches, not an extraterrestrial visitation.

via Space|

#cape-canaveral #falcon-9 #jellyfish-cloud

space2 hours ago•92 min saved

NASA's fridge-sized quantum lab on the ISS expands ultracold-atom research in orbit

A refurbished upgrade to NASA's Cold Atom Laboratory aboard the International Space Station—about the size of a mini-fridge—lets scientists study ultracold atoms and Bose-Einstein condensates in microgravity, enabling longer observation of quantum behaviors and paving the way for future space-based quantum technologies in timing, navigation, and gravity sensing.

via Live Science|

#bose-einstein-condensate #cold-atom-laboratory #iss

space5 hours ago•105 min saved

Nearby ravenous black hole mirrors early-universe feeding frenzy

Astronomers observe a supermassive black hole at the center of SDSS J110546.07+145202.4 (about 1.8 billion light-years away) in a rapid accretion phase, launching jets and causing a roughly 20-fold increase in radio brightness over about eight years. The behavior resembles the vigorous feeding seen in the early universe, providing a nearby laboratory to study extreme accretion physics and jet production. The finding, published in The Astrophysical Journal (May), suggests such rapidly changing radio galaxies could help fill gaps in our understanding of early galaxy growth, with future SKA surveys expected to identify more transients.

via Space|

#accretion #black-holes #early-universe

space9 hours ago•12 min saved

DMS hints on a distant ocean-world exoplanet spark debate over life signals

K2-18b, a sub-Neptune about 124 light-years away, is a leading Hycean candidate that could harbor a global ocean beneath a hydrogen-rich atmosphere. Webb observations yielded two tentative signals of dimethyl sulfide, a gas commonly linked to marine life on Earth, but independent analyses question whether DMS was truly detected, leaving the existence of a biosignature on the planet unresolved and highlighting the need for more data and standardized detection criteria.

via Space Daily|

#biosignature #dimethyl-sulfide #exoplanets

space9 hours ago•10 min saved

Webb detects two-faced WASP-121b: scorching dusk and cloudy dawn

JWST mapped WASP-121b’s atmosphere longitude by longitude during a single transit as the planet rotated, revealing a hotter, expanded evening limb with water dissociation and a cooler morning limb possibly hosting silicate clouds; this rotational‑transit effect shows strong day–night circulation on this ultra-hot Jupiter (dayside ~2770 K, nightside ~1000 K) and highlights how limb-averaged spectra can miss key chemistry and cloud features.

via Space Daily|

#atmospheric-circulation #clouds #exoplanets

space15 hours ago•12 min saved

Sub-Neptunes Could Forge Oceans from Within

A Nature study shows that many planets called sub-Neptunes can synthesize their own water deep inside, by hydrogen in their thick atmospheres reacting with molten rock to produce H2O. If common, this could make water much more widespread in the galaxy and not just delivered by comets or asteroids. However, the water forms interiorly and may not always become a surface ocean, and these results are experimental/theoretical, requiring integration into formation models and observational tests to assess implications for habitability.

via Space Daily|

#exoplanets #magma-ocean #planetary-chemistry

space17 hours ago•12 min saved

Titan's Methane Rivers Echo Earth's Hydrology, Flowing Through Ice

Titan, Saturn's largest moon, hosts standing surface liquid—methane and ethane—driven by a slow hydrological cycle that forms rivers, rain, lakes and seas, with bedrock of water ice and surface features mapped by Cassini-Huygens; Kraken Mare and Ligeia Mare are fed by Vid Flumina, and a Dragonfly rotorcraft mission is planned for the 2030s to study Titan up close; while Earthlike in form, Titan's cycle uses different liquids and conditions, and life as we know it is unlikely.

via Space Daily|

#dragonfly-mission #ethane #methane

technology18 hours ago•2 min saved

Orbital Sunbeam: FCC greenlights Reflect Orbital's demo mirror satellite

The FCC has granted approval for Reflect Orbital’s Eärendil-1 demonstration satellite, which will deploy an 18-by-18 meter aluminized Mylar reflector to direct sunlight onto Earth from a near-polar orbit around 625 km up. The test aims to prove “sunlight on demand” for solar farms and other uses, with a broader constellation contemplated in the future, but the agency only approved radio operations for the demo and did not authorize a full constellation. Critics warn about potential interference with ground-based astronomy, wildlife, aviation, sky brightness, and the growing debris risk, while disposal within 25 years is required; SpaceX is slated to carry the first two demos, and further approvals will be needed for expansion.

via TechSpot|

#astronomy #reflective-mirror #satellites

space20 hours ago•104 min saved

Cosmic ghost neutrinos whisper from ancient supernovae

Researchers analyzing 14 years of data from the Super-Kamiokande detector report a likely signal of the Diffuse Supernova Neutrino Background—the universe’s background of neutrinos from all past core-collapse supernovas—marking a potential first detection of these cosmic 'ghost' particles; if confirmed, it would illuminate how dying stars enrich their environments and form compact remnants, with plans to combine data with Hyper-Kamiokande to boost sensitivity.

via Space|

#astrophysics #diffuse-supernova-neutrino-background #neutrinos

space20 hours ago•23 min saved

New Horizons Wakes to Edge of Solar System

NASA’s New Horizons has awakened from a 321‑day hibernation about 64 astronomical units from Earth (roughly 10 billion km) and will begin sending back a year’s worth of stored data while studying the outer heliosphere’s termination shock—the boundary where the solar wind slows and blends with interstellar material. Having passed Pluto and Arrokoth, the probe is now venturing farther into the Kuiper Belt region and beyond, with no new target identified; its path could see it leaving the Kuiper Belt around 2028–2029 as it continues toward interstellar space, with an approximate nine‑hour one‑way radio link and a current “green” status from mission control.

via ZME Science|

#heliosphere #interstellar-space #kuiper-belt

space21 hours ago•5 min saved

China nails first sea-based recovery of a reusable rocket

China’s Long March-10B successfully completed its maiden flight and recovered its first-stage booster on a sea-based net, marking the country’s first controlled recovery of a reusable orbital rocket and signaling progress toward lower-cost launches alongside SpaceX and Blue Origin.

via Business Insider|

#booster-recovery #long-march-10b #reusable-rocket

technology23 hours ago•6 min saved

FCC Clears Earendil-1 Space Mirror Test to Reflect Sunlight Back to Earth

The FCC approved a single demonstration satellite, Earendil-1 by Reflect Orbital, which uses a 60-by-60-foot mirror to reflect sunlight onto Earth over a ground area roughly 3 miles wide. The company envisions benefits like powering solar farms at night or aiding disaster relief, but astronomers and environmental groups raised concerns, contributing about 1,800 public comments. The agency says this is a limited, short-term test and did not require an environmental review; Reflect Orbital plans to launch later this year and pursue independent research and NSF coordination.

via PCMag|

#astronomy #light-pollution #regulation